


Every Fairy Tale Comes Real

by primeideal



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Cryptographer Finn, F/M, Force Ghosts, Post-Episode VII
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-27
Updated: 2016-02-27
Packaged: 2018-05-23 13:16:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6117601
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/primeideal/pseuds/primeideal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Seven million languages,” Finn asks, “and you can't decode in any of them?”<br/>--<br/>Finn carries a torch (if not a lightsaber) for a woman who sees ghosts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Every Fairy Tale Comes Real

Finn doesn't often find himself sympathizing with BB-8's exasperated whirrs that mean something like _organics_. But as he huddles with the others, amassed at the port, he wonders whether their sentiment has any place in the middle of the fight. A couple liaisons when people are off-duty are one thing, and he's assured that a few more would hardly be amiss. But the way seemingly _everyone_ just waits off-duty seems so inefficient. Are they leaving themselves vulnerable?

BB-8 beeps judgmentally at him. “All right, all right, the First Order wasted just as much time too. Only in our case, it was archival presentations about the glories of the Empire.”

Blip-blip.

“With patchy hologram projections in lieu of arriving spaceships. It wasn't exactly like Darth Vader or anyone was going to show up just because we'd been force-marched into an auditorium to salute.”

The little droid hums, flickering bright lights.

“You go find Poe,” Finn waves, and BB-8 doesn't need telling twice.

He was unconscious for the _Millennium Falcon's_ most recent departure, but he's not really enraptured by the ship itself—some of his comrades-in-arms still look up to it in awe, content to wait their turn to meet the people inside. It's the little R2 droid that rolls down the ramp and over to its protocol friend first, as if nothing has happened. Maybe the onlooking crowds and their emotion mean nothing to the astromech, or maybe it's processing at a deeper level than any of them can see.

At least Chewbacca has no room for subtlety. When he charges off the ship to embrace his human friends, suddenly nobody wants to stay still. Finn is grateful; he's used to being on the move. And even as part of him is wondering why he _really_ needs anything more to do with the _Falcon_ , the rest is racing towards Rey, who's run down the ramp too to meet him. “ _Finn_ ,” she says. “It's me!”

“Well,” says Finn, “yes?” Exactly who else would it be? The First Order's cloning technology isn't that good, and it sounds like Luke Skywalker hasn't had a lot of other choices for co-pilots in recent months. She doesn't look quite as nervy and raw as the scavenger he met back in Jakku, of course—she's gained command of _something_ while he's been working on data security at the base. The _Falcon_? The Force? Herself?

“I came back,” she repeats, and maybe a little bit of irrelevant babble is a new side effect of long-distance hyperspeed travel from dubiously-marked maps. So he just hugs her instead, to BB-8's approving buzzes.

When she lets go, Poe has made his way over, and Finn brightens. “Oh, hey. Rey, this is Poe Dameron. Poe, this is Rey.”

“Yeah,” Poe giggles, “we've met.”

“Do I miss _everything_?” he blurts.

“No,” says Rey. “There's still a future. I don't know what it'll look like, but you haven't missed it. _We_ haven't missed it.”

The relief that not even a Jedi student can know which way the future is set, that there's still room for their choices to matter, washes over him, and he doesn't need Poe to translate to believe that BB-8's beeping is saying the same thing. And maybe, amid the war, there will be a little bit of a future for him-and-Rey. There will still be time, and he doesn't have to worry about racing ahead.

Famous last words.

* * *

“Seven million languages,” Finn asks, “and you can't decode in _any_ of them?”

“Now, really,” C-3PO harumphs, pacing around the spacious upper-story room, “you can hardly expect me to be fluent in the dreadful signals of those tyrants, I'm relieved to say I've escaped any opportunities for—”

Finn waves a hand, typing at the antiquated terminal and blinking past a sequence of images that flash into view. “I get it.”

“Well, if I can be of any assistance, please do let me know.”

“Start going through the low-security trade messages and find out if any topics are high frequency right now. Maybe they'll be on the First Order's private comms, too.”

C-3PO slowly maneuvers to another mainframe and begins executing the vague commands. Finn would prefer the help of a newer droid, but will take what he can get.

Gradually, a few blips start to emerge in the data, and their programs point to a few educated guesses. The Resistance's counterintelligence unit has become, if not comfortable, familiar. Technically, they could be doing this from almost anywhere with a strong enough computer system, and the irony of the fact that he could still run away to some distant asteroids hasn't escaped him or his superior officers. Even within the base, it's not the most secure-looking room. The high, bright windows seem a relic of a more peaceful time, but if anyone wanted to overhear him, by the time they were close enough to get a bead on him their entire cause would have far more important problems.

Before he can make a more detailed stab at deciphering anything else, he's interrupted by the door swinging open, revealing an interloper he hadn't heard approaching. “Good afternoon!” C-3PO immediately turns and regards their guest. “Miss Rey!”

“Hello!” She smiles, holding up a small bag. “Finn, have you eaten?”

“No, not yet. Are you free?” He can only hope she's been hoping to see him as much as he has kept one eye roving to the door like a droid with a repetitive virus. But between his repetitive work schedule and her ever-shifting regimen, they've missed connections outside large assemblies.

“Just for a little while. I brought you some lunch, I thought maybe—”

“Have a seat,” he says quickly. He could get lunch whenever he wants, which is usually less when his body tells him he's hungry and more when he can't take one more minute of C-3PO bemoaning heavy nebula cover making it difficult to intercept anything worthwhile. Indeed, their room is wedged between a large but cramped mess hall below, and a mostly-outdated provisions repository above. But it's the chance to catch up with Rey that makes the break appealing, of course.

Instead of resting, she crosses the room, brushing his hand as she tries to hand off the bag to him. Then she pauses, her eyes not taking in the computers or the views of the shipyard, but whirls around. “Who's there?”

“Excuse me?” C-3PO tuts.

“Sssh,” Rey hisses, stepping towards the upper staircase on light feet. Finn tenses, wishing he could be useful—what weapon could he bring to her aid, though, even at short range? Against some unseen adversary, her skill in the Force is her, is _all_ of their best defense.

“Threepio,” he finally suggests, “go downstairs, tell—Skywalker. There's—”

“No,” says Rey, approaching the flight of stairs. She holds up a hand experimentally, as if feeling her way through darkness, then abruptly shivers and turns back. “It's gone. He's gone.”

“What?”

“I saw a man. A vision. You didn't see him?”

Finn shakes his head. “My sensors are not always equipped for optimal perception of visual light,” C-3PO explains.

“He looked...old,” Rey goes on. “Wounded. I knew he wasn't a threat, somehow, that I could follow him. But when I got close, he was gone.”

“Perhaps you ought to be continuing with your normal meals,” said C-3PO, “where you'll be less distracted.”

“Threepio!” she snaps.

“I believe you,” Finn says, “you know that, right?”

Rey gives a quiet smile. “It's still good to hear.”

Lunch isn't as filling as it could be, with the tension of Rey looking over her shoulder every once in a while, and over his or C-3PO's shoulders the rest of the time. But maybe that's what it's like, eating lunch with a trainee Jedi, and the only way to confirm would be to see what she's like the rest of the time. He'll have to investigate.

* * *

If Rey had been an enemy operative, he didn't think he'd have needed to overanalyze the bits and pieces of her life he gleaned from watching those around her. BB-8 flashed in a lilting rhythm when she practiced tickling the robot from afar. Poe was exhilarated to find someone just as competitive when it came to practice races in atmosphere, to General Organa's official disapproval. As for Luke Skywalker, he walked with a sense of purpose around her, and Finn had never known him any other way. C-3PO gravely informed him that this was the greatest transformation of all.

So it would be easy, he told himself, to take his place in Rey's life. Take _some_ place, anyway. When Chewbacca accidentally sprung a leak in the _Millennium Falcon_ 's coolant system, he thought he'd seize his chance. “Don't worry about it,” he said. “I can put it back together. Tonight?”

“Nrwl,” Chewbacca said, which he hoped was roughly “go for it.”

As predicted, either Rey didn't want to miss out on anything important happening on the illustrious ship, Luke didn't want her to miss out on an opportunity for her to do some humble labor, or possibly both. Either way, she showed up a few minutes after he'd isolated the malfunctioning unit and started picking it apart with his boltcrank. For better or worse, at least that wasn't too different from Starkiller Base.

“Hello!” she calls. “Er, can I help?”

“If you don't mind,” says Finn, “I'd love some company.”

Rey nods, walking over to the thermodule. “We should be able to cool down the ship, anyway.” She reaches out for it, then pauses, drawing back. A few moments later, the ship is substantially colder, and if it's not as painful as the exterior of Starkiller Base, Finn has a few brief memories of confronting powers beyond his comprehension.

“That was _you_?”

“Er, yeah. Maybe not the best long-term solution, but I'm supposed to be _practicing_. Sorry!” She taps at the thermodule again, and the ship is suddenly _much_ hotter.

He'd really like to take care of the issue at hand, but he also doesn't want to let on his frustration when it still takes them days to say more than two sentences to each other at a time. “Great. Um, I think that definitely counts as a success.”

“I guess I should try not ripping this off the wall?” Rey asks, stepping away from the thermodule.

“Yeah, you want to, uh, finesse the bolts, a little. If you can.”

“Sure.” She steps back again and a bolt pops off; then it changes direction mid-air, slows down, and she catches it on the fly. Then she detaches the second and third from across the corridor, snagging them one by one. The sound of the bolts deadens as they land on her palms.

The useless component pivots around to hang from its last remaining bolt. Almost as an afterthought, Rey severs its connection too, but then she jerks away, taking a step towards the lower cargo hold, and it's Finn who's leaning over to grab the bolt just before it falls to the floor, his unaided reflexes just enough to let him snatch it before the thermodule falls. Neither of them are paying attention when it picks up another dent which would decommission it even further.

“Did you see that?” Rey asks.

“Uh, you're very impressive with the Force, if that's what you mean.”

“Belowdecks. A light.”

They exchange a glance, and then he looks away, shaking his head.

“Like before. Maybe if I...” She steps down, then farther. “Hello?” she calls. “Can you hear me?”

There's no answer. Of course, Finn hadn't expected to hear anything, but Rey gives no sign that she's sensed anything different.

“I'm going to see,” she decides, hurrying down.

“Can—should I come?” He still trusts her, trusts that it's some Jedi thing and he'll be out of his depth, or maybe he just _wants_ it to be the case that she's not ignoring him in favor of people who aren't really there.

Rey's almost out of sight in the cargo hold when she calls “Just don't do anything I wouldn't do.”

Good enough for him. Boltcrank in hand, he clambers down after her, pulling up a step shy of her in the semidarkness.

“Hold on!” she calls. “Please—we're friends.”

She sprints across the room until Finn can barely see her, and he's half-afraid she's going to discover some hibernating cargo of Han's that nobody had accounted for, but instead she just freezes in her tracks. “Lost him.”

“Him?” Finn echoes.

“A little kid this time. But very serious-looking, like he'd seen a lot. I thought I was supposed to know him, somehow.”

“I, um, General Organa's briefed us on some of Kylo Ren's kills. Do you think it's possible?”

“One of _his_ victims? I don't know. I—can't remember.”

“It's not your problem.”

“I think these visions very much _are_ my problem!”

“I mean, it's not your fault...you shouldn't have to recognize strangers you've never seen, you have a life of your own.”

“Well,” she says, catching up to him at the bottom of the stairs, “thanks.”

“You're telling Skywalker about these, right?”

“Yeah. He says it's just part of the process and that he'll try to make introductions if any of his 'friends' show up when I'm studying with him. But I'm not sure his social life has been all that exciting.”

“There you go. Don't worry about it.”

“I guess,” says Rey. Once they reach the top of the stairs, she looks back, but there's nothing of note.

“So,” Finn says, “do you know any good Force tricks for actually putting this thermodule back together? Or do we have to do it the slow way?”

“I've been practicing one.”

“And that is?”

“Convincing Chewbacca he really wants to do it instead.”

* * *

It's Rey who makes the offer of a holochess game, since the only competition she's really gotten for a while is Chewbacca, and that still doesn't exactly count as fair “competition.” Finn jumps at the chance, because the games of Poe's he winds up playing with the other pilots are fun but wild, and trying to cut side deals with half the table just isn't the same.

But after they can't really find a time for holochess, either, not after he's exhausted from long shifts staring at the consoles, trying to glean patterns from random noise, and she's awake at odd hours, fashioning weapons and living by a regimen all her own. The first time they try they start snapping at each other within three moves over house rules.

Finally, Finn hits on the idea of setting up a board in the corner of the decryption room where they can just take turns moving on their own time, whenever they're passing through, and C-3PO will officiously preserve the position's integrity from any interfering bystanders (R2-D2 and BB-8 have taken to rolling past with amused beeps, but at least they don't disturb the pieces).

Rey has the more advantageous position, Finn decides one day working late and trying not to glance over yet again. Not because her pieces are on the attack—they're scattered, while he's built up a solid defense. But because she can focus and choose to come by just when she's ready, and the rest of her day doesn't have the board as a built-in distraction. While he's stuck there thinking about it, thinking about _her_...

Then she walks in, striding over to size up the board. “Is it my turn yet?” she asks C-3PO.

“Indeed,” the droid indicates. “Finn moved here after lunch.”

“A threat...?”

“No it's not!” Finn stands up. It was a maneuver to give his pieces more flexibility in the future, supporting each other, but not positioned for a direct capture. If she's going to describe his strategy wrong, she can do it to his face.

“Not _you_ ,” she says. “The visions. It's not Ren, it _can't_ be, but someone powerful...”

“Have any of them tried to hurt you so far? Mostly they just disappear.”

“You don't need to tell me twice,” she says, and runs for the stairs.

“Well, I daresay I want nothing to do with these apparitions!” C-3PO declares, slowly moving towards the door.

“Can you—” Finn calls, but the droid is already making an unceremonious exit.

Finn pauses a moment, then decides to log out of the computers rather than run after her and leave the decryption station completely unattended. If there really is some kind of threat—a person, that moves around unseen by him?—he doesn't want it reading over his shoulder.

But in those few seconds as the screen goes dark, Rey's footsteps are already growing fainter above him. “Come on and face me!”

The thud of her slow, dejected descent moments later tells him all he needs to know; the mysterious wraith remains as shrouded in darkness as ever. “I'm sorry,” he offers.

“It's not your fault,” Rey shrugs. He starts booting up the computers again, waiting for them to slowly load, and Rey begins getting her bearings. “Why did I come in here?”

“Holochess?” he smiles.

“Right.” She paces over. “Okay, so _where_ did you go?”

“Over here,” Finn points.

“Okay,” Rey nods. “Sorry, I'll come back to this tomorrow, maybe? Luke wants me to tell him about all the visions and I don't think I'm able to focus that well...”

“What,” teases Finn, “you're not subconsciously analyzing the board and intuiting the best moves while fighting unseen enemies?”

Rey glares at him.

“Take your time. I'm not going anywhere.”

“Thank you,” she says, and reaches over to hug him. He steps out of the way before they knock over the holochess board, but for a moment it's enough to stand there in each other's hands.

Then C-3PO comes back. “I say! I should hope there aren't any dangers to be wary of?”

“Right,” says Rey. “see you,” and takes off before the door closes behind the droid.

* * *

A few days later Finn finds himself up earlier in the morning than is typical, and can't get back to sleep. Technically he could probably get to work, it isn't like droids have a sleep cycle to respect, but he takes the chance to walk outside and try to see the planet as Rey does, savoring every shade of green.

After about the third shade of green he gets bored and resigns himself to the fact that he and Rey are two very different people. He's heading back inside when he hears a voice from the forest; “Now make it rise above you—on that limb. Good!”

There's no way Finn's going to sneak up on two people using the Force, but he can square himself up to walk with purpose and stride into the clearing before he has time to change his mind. Rey turns to him, and a tree frog drops out of a tree high above her.

“Finn!” she calls. “Are you all right?”

“I'm fine. Sorry to intrude. I was hoping to speak to you, Master Skywalker, when you're free.”

“Call me Luke, please,” he says. “What's happening?”

“I...well...a lot of things. But I wanted to talk about these visions Rey's been having. Have you seen them?” Rey glances over at him. The tree frog turns over on its back, stretched out in the long shadows. “I _can't_ , but I want to help out somehow.”

“I think,” Luke says, “that it is likely I have seen the ghost who has also appeared to Rey. But not when I've been in her presence, no.”

“So you've never seen it with Master—with Luke? Or Leia or Poe or BB-8 or _anyone_?”

“No,” says Rey. “Just with you.”

“Then I think the ghost is haunting _me_!”

“It well may be,” Luke says.

The tree frog leaps up and begins climbing another tree behind them. “Does that mean he can sense the Force, too?” asks Rey.

Luke glances at him as if stalling for time, but it's needless. There have been so many forces pushing and pulling on him over the years that Finn can't imagine having room for one more. “I don't believe so.”

“It's all right,” says Finn—Rey almost seems to be more disappointed in this than he is—“but do you have any idea, um, why a ghost would be following me around?”

Luke shrugs. “Not for certain. We can guess!”

“I mean, I have a past. So does everyone on this base, and nobody else makes Rey run for the staircase every time we meet.”

“If I ever see a ghost in your company, I'll be happy to introduce you.”

“Hey!” Rey cuts in. “Shouldn't I get priority? If they ever stick around long enough to talk to me, that is.”

“Feel free,” says Luke. “I'm not going to assign you to follow Finn around in the hopes of conjuring spirits.”

“ _Assign_? He's my friend, I'd be more than happy to translate.” And the tree frog does a somersault as it glides from one branch to another.

“Well, then. We can only hope it graces us with another visit.”

“Is there anything I can do to make them feel more, uh, at home?” Finn asks. “Without using the Force, I mean.”

“Not to my knowledge.”

“Okay. Can I ask you a personal question?”

Rey's eyes widen, but Luke merely says “Yes. I might not answer.”

“Why do you carry the lightsaber? The one Rey had, I mean. General Organa says you still use your green one.”

Luke pauses and says “Rey gave it to me, and I think it's appropriate to accept what's given and not deny my past.”

“Is that what you use to spar with?” he asks Rey.

“Yeah. I'm still waiting on the materials to make my own, Luke really wants me to.”

“Okay. I...was wondering if I could borrow it, for a while.”

“To fight with?” Luke asks. “There are more efficient weapons at short range.”

“He held off _Kylo Ren_ with that!” says Rey. “Give him a chance!”

“If it comes to a fight, I'll feel safer with you two wielding these,” says Finn. “But I was thinking about the ghost. If I have something Jedi use, maybe it'll give me a connection, somehow.”

Luke goes quiet and Finn wonders if he's trying, unnecessarily, to let him down gently again. But instead he just reaches for the weapon at his belt, weighing it in his hands. “You took this up once before, not for glory or sentiment, but to stop others from having it—those who would use it for harm, and those who were not yet ready to carry its weight.”

“Yeah, okay?” says Finn. “So you've been briefed?” And Rey is probably scandalized that he's talking back to Luke Skywalker this way, but it's too early in the morning to start looking for deeper meanings.

“I think that proves twice over that I can entrust you with this now.” Luke passes off the weapon with no further ceremony than the half-dozen other frogs making their way among the lower branches. “I'd tell you to take care of it, but really, if you wind up losing it in some shaft, it's probably no skin off my back.”

Finn doesn't dare look too closely, but he's pretty sure he sees Rey mutter something about _just your arm, Master_ under her breath.

“Thank you. I'll do my best,” he says.

“Will that be all?” Luke asks.

“For now, I think. I'll leave you to it?”

“You'd better let me spend time with him at some point,” Rey says, “just in case the ghost comes back.”

“All things in time,” says Luke.

Finn takes off, wondering whether he'll need to acquisition a workbelt, or whether that will get him too many questions about why he has a lightsaber. It doesn't feel quite right to test it yet, but he turns it over in his grasp as dawn rises above the base.

* * *

Of course, Finn should have counted on the fact that C-3PO, just like everyone else, would be a little perturbed at the sight of him carrying a lightsaber. Actually, all things being equal, the droid takes it well—not seeming to react to the fact that it's _Finn_ with a new weapon, just not wanting anything pointed in his general direction. “I say! You're not going to turn that thing on, are you?”

“I sure am,” Finn glares, “unless you're going to do it for me.”

“Do it _for_ you? What's the point in toting a weapon you're unable to wield?”

“Weapon? I thought you were going to turn on _this_ thing.” Finn pokes at a sluggish computer. There's been an uptick in communications ostensibly masked as “mining guild” operations that he's pretty sure are a front, but there will be time to poke through those.

After they've vouched for maybe a third of them as having anything to do with energy sources, Finn decides a break is in store before they proceed to the more tightly encrypted messages. He walks upstairs towards the miscellaneous supplies room, in hopes there will be some kind of unobtrusive sheath he can wear to keep himself, and the lightsaber, safe from questions.

When he walks into the room, the first thing he sees are a stack of helmets like Poe's. Strong enough to guard what's behind them, but not completely opaque. Five of them stacked tall—no, six. Rey is kneeling across the room, staring at it and several other towers of bric-a-brac she appears to have assembled silently.

“Sorry,” he says, “just looking for supplies.”

“It's fine. Can I help?”

“Can you find a scabbard?”

“No more quickly than you.”

“Don't let me keep you.”

“It's all right. Hopefully the raw materials will get here soon, I can make my own, and then you can return the favor.”

So he starts opening boxes and sorting through them, nudging a few towards the center that seem more useful to the cause than his specific purposes. Are the blasters still relevant at close range, or are they outdated? Rey is the faster scavenger, of course, and he's not surprised that after just a few boxes she hisses “Finn, your lightsaber!”

“Yeah?” he says, taking it out and walking to pass it off to her. Though she should know where it would fit, really, she _fought_ with it—

“Turn it on, he's here!”

The moment has none of battle's instantaneous panic, but it really is as easy as that. Immediately, the blue light greets them both, and maybe unseen eyes.

Then Rey is chattering into what appears to be empty space. “Don't go! Please talk to me—well, us, Finn can't see you, but—we want to understand. Who are you?”

 _Hold on_ , she mouths, and his hand begins to sweat around the lightsaber.

“ _What_?” Rey blurts, and after tense pauses, begins relaying the ghostly half of the conversation. “Anakin Skywalker—Darth Vader?”

Darth Vader has been haunting him? “Uh. It would be a great honor if I could actually meet you,” says Finn. “Don't you have family to reconnect with, or something?”

“You've been watching out for me,” Rey repeats. “For _how_ long? That can't be true.”

“And why me?” Finn presses.

“He says—he admires you. Ever since you defied the command to kill, for the First Order—that you saw more in minutes than he did in years.”

And Vader—Skywalker has just been seeing him, silently, for weeks and months? “Why are you here?”

“Something about our presence makes it easier for him to take shape here. The Force is always in flux, and he's still there to offer guidance to Luke and Leia when they need him. But against chaos, even ghosts can use inspiration.”

“The lightsaber?”

“Maybe. Could just be you!”

“It's not the Force.”

“Breaking free from darkness could be just as rare.”

“Well, sir, I hope you can come back. Even if our conversations get a little inefficient.” His normal approach of “programming a bot subroutine as a translation workaround” doesn't seem like it's going to fly.

“I'll help,” says Rey. “As often as I can, I promise.”

“Can you appear _anywhere_ with the Force? Just to other adepts? Go to Kylo Ren's base and bring us his coordinates, maybe,” Finn suggests.

Rey laughs. “He says that won't be easy but there you go, he admires your spirit.” Finn can't exactly say the same, not yet, since it's still _Darth Vader_ they're talking about, but it's a start. The ghost appears to have switched back to talking to Rey, since she continues answering him: “Uh-huh. Yes. Well, it certainly will be with...oh, never mind. Okay.”

“What?”

“He said he'll try. To come back here, at least, no promises about Kylo Ren's base.”

“Okay. Listen, thank you so much for translating, I—it means a lot.”

“It's the least I can do.”

“Oh, no it's not. You can still help me find a sheath for this scabbard.”

“Something tells me you're not going to need it anymore, if you don't want.”

“What, the Force?”

“Just a hunch. That there's enough of an—anchor, now, for him to talk to us.”

“So should I give the lightsaber back to Luke?”

“Keep it until he needs it back,” says Rey, “you still look great with it—”

She looks around quickly, as if checking the room for ghosts; then, as satisfied as she can be that nobody visible is watching, dodges the still-glowing light and kisses him. Eagerly returning the kiss, he's too startled to even think of turning it off.

“If I'd known posing with a sword was all it took,” he finally says, trying to sound confident, “I'd have stolen that from Luke the day you got back.”

“I'm sorry,” says Rey. “I never meant to ignore you.”

“Is this going to be okay? With Luke and everyone?”

“He's pushing me fast because there's no one else. Us and Leia, we're the only ones who can sense it. But you're by far the best source of intelligence we have on the First Order, so I think you're about as irreplaceable at work as I am. I still don't expect much in the way of downtime, but if you want to be something more than friends, let's just make a point of it.” She pauses. “And maybe find room somewhere on your servers to save our holochess games so Threepio doesn't have to knock it over?”

“Consider it done,” says Finn. “He's cool with _Jedi_ kissing?”

“If the Jedi aren't him, sure. I don't know how they did it before the ancient times, exactly, but the Imperial traditions don't matter. I guess we can ask Anakin next time he shows up.” Rey pauses. “You don't think _Anakin_ was...hoping we'd get together, do you?”

“I can only hope Darth Vader has much better things to do with his infinite reserves of time than take an interest in my love life.” Finn stacks together the boxes with weapons. “Why?”

“I mean, he likes you. And he sees me as some kind of...honorary student, I don't know...”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“Long story. Ask Luke.”

“Oh, come on.”

“It was just a thought. Anyway, we should probably explain...” she flicks her hand back and forth between the two of them “this...to C-3PO before he short-circuits.”

“I'll try,” says Finn. “After talking to ghosts, what's a kiss?”

“If that's a competition,” says Rey, “I can show you a few more.”

Beyond the confines of space and time, the Force continues to pulse and chime and course with life, opening the way to unseen possibilities. Anakin's lightsaber is still blue in his hand.

**Author's Note:**

> So I owe you another story explaining just how related-or-not Anakin and Rey are in this verse, and I'm sorry about leaving that vague, but I wrote myself into a corner with this point of view character. Prequel will definitely happen, but maybe not for a while.
> 
> I haven't been seeking out secondary canon so I've made no effort to be compliant with that except from what I've heard by osmosis, and one of the details I loved is that Poe plays Space Settlers of Catan. <3 I think I stole the image of Finn and Rey playing holochess from another fic I liked earlier in this fandom.
> 
> I am taking credit for Cryptographer Finn, though! :P
> 
> Super-late follow-up: first, I'm wrong, and it's actually Snap Wexley who plays Space Settlers of Catan. Oh well, he probably forces Poe to play it with him sometimes!
> 
> Also, [We'll Wake And Open Up Our Eyes](http://archiveofourown.org/works/8497768) is the long-awaited prequel!


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